Reliability of the teen risk screen: A movement skill screening checklist for teachers

Abstract

The importance of fundamental movement skills (FMS) are often taken for granted. It is expected that these movement skills will be adequate to get children through their school career, however, some children struggle. Teachers play an important role, as they are able to observe children in the classroom, as well as in a Physical Education setting. This study aims to provide an easy-to-administer, reliable screening checklist to determine children’s FMS. The study sample consisted of 125 girls and seven classroom teachers from a selected school in Stellenbosch, South Africa. The checklist consisted of seven subscales. Cronbach alpha values, confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), partial least squares (PLS) path analyses, Spearman correlations and agreement intra-class correlations (ICC) were calculated. The results indicated that the data supported the reliability of the checklist. Most of the mentioned statistical models fitted the data well. All the scales except one, confirmed an acceptable fit and reliability coefficients reached acceptable values. There is a scarcity of research in this area. Future quality research is vital using validated screening checklists in conjunction with validated movement skill assessment tools.

Key words: Fundamental motor skills; Screening tool; Children; Teachers.